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My First Foreign Trip

Are my readers still here? If so then, here is a post for you all. "My First ..." had been a regular on my blog, so I thought of naming this as My First Foreign Trip.

A trip about which I knew from the day I decided to join Magma. Well thats again something to write about "My First Job" :-) The rest of my team is in San Jose and a training programme was being planned there. I applied for the visa interview and readied the papers. That is another big story of how we all feared a visa rejection as one of my colleagues was rejected visa to US a week earlier. Fortunately, I was not asked anything other than my salary and invite letter from my company. The Madamme at the counter was glad to accept my passport after that. ;-)

In the meantime, my manager here returned from US and suggested that I should go and present our product in a conference (DAC - Design Automation Conference, a renowned one in EDA). With the product still in development, the situation was little dicey. My trip to the conference hung in the hands of the developers who are going to get the product readied in time for the DEMO.

At last, two days before my travel, the trip was confirmed. Being in a relatively small company like Magma, travel is a pain in the ass. And the HR and facilities department being in Bangalore office makes it more so. A series of emails and phone calls. I get the travel approved from the VP, the tickets booked from the travel agent, the forex delivered. Well I applied for the American Express Corporate Card but I was never going to get it before I leave.

There was some last minute shopping left. On the day I was leaving, my manager tells me that it is better to have a blazer with me as I am going to present in the conference. Cant YOU tell me that before???

And of course the STAY. Bangalore guys wont book it for me. I dont have the Amex card yet. The US facilities people are in a different time zone. Lucky enough that my credit card is valid internationally. Hopefully it will be reimbursed.

Goodbyes and requests for chocolates from cube-neighbours!!!!!!!!

There I leave for my first foreign trip. More about the trip as I travel.

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